Dear Friends,
Living in Hurricane Country is not so different from living in Earthquake Country is some respects. You tend to try to keep a full pantry and emergency supplies read. But it’s in the predictability of hurricanes. You can see one developing and coming, but you can’t really uproot for every storm…and sometimes they change track and sometimes they suddenly develop in scale. The meteorological foreplay over a developing storm can be nerve wracking at times.
With earthquakes…they happen or they don’t. *shrugs*
Then again I grew up with them, we did earthquake drills when I was in grade school.
I remember one time I as out to dinner with a friend who was new to Alaska and he started freaking out… “What was that?!” I blinked, confused for a moment, and then saw the hanging light fixture above the table swinging. I realized that a minor earth tremor must have happened. You get so used to them growing up in earthquake country that if they are below a certain level you stop noticing them.
Surprisingly, or perhaps not so surprisingly, you get used to Tropical Storms and Hurricanes… in a different way of course. It becomes a level of worry and preparedness. You have so much more covereage of the weather in an area prone to hurricanes, every local tv station has an extensive weather bureau for example. If it’s ‘just’ a Tropical Storm or below a certain level of Hurricane of if the dominant storm track isn’t to bad, your kind of zen about it.
Last October with Hurricane Matthew for example, the storm was going up the Eastern Coast of Florida. Orlando and Central Florida were expecting high winds and heavy rains, but would have been on the outer edges of the storm. Even though it was a Category 5 it was not actually making landfall. Even with the curfews and the constant emergency alert coverage, and the mandatory evacuations along the coast, Central Floridians were relatively ‘meh’ about it. We bough our supplies and prepared…
But then Disney announced they would be closing the Parks…
(Which they have done this 4 times since the park opened in 1971 )
THAT was when folks in Orlando and Central Florida started to get *real* nervous…
Anyway, the Fabulous Jonathan and I are keeping an eye out and my fingers crossed…
Peace,
Pax / Geoffrey
Chrysalis 
I’m glad to know it’s not just me who shrugs when they say, “It’s a category 1 hurricane coming for Florida.”
No… heck I moved to Florida right before Wilma brushed through the Keys… I had been in Florida a few months and lost my blessed mind. My partner at the time kept reacting much as one would when humoring a child… “It’s in the keys…” “we should be fine” “If you feel the need go ahead and get some supplies….”